With all the talk about single handing, M.O.B. and Phil's reminder about the difference between Bay running and truly off-shore sailing reminded me of a story I read in Peter Nichols' Sea Change. "People have been tossed overboard during vulnerable moments between clip-on points. Our friend from St. Jean, Ingrid Bergstrom, coming out of Vagabond's companionway, wearing a harness but not yet having reached a clip on point, was tossed overboard at night in a gale in the Mediterranean, a certain death sentence. Her husband Seven rang a deck bell that summoned Leif {his son} to the cockpit. 'Ingrid's gone overboard,' he said. 'Hold this course.' Sven went below to the chart table and, despite a mind reeling from shock, calculated what ground would be lost turning around, drift from wind and waves, the boat's reciprocal course and likely speed, and the speed and time elapsed since Ingrid had gone overbaord, then mixed all these together and plotted a new course back to that spot. he went back up to the cockpit and only then did he and Leif turn the boat around and go back along the course he had decided upon to look for her. They found her and got her aboard. A miracle." (pp. 57-58)
What seamanship! Just a reminder that knowledge, experience, a cool head...and a mriacle from time to time...go a long way.
You may like the book. The musings of a recently divorced man crossing the Atlantic alone in a leaky wooden boat...no engine, no gps...and lives to tell about it!
Dave Tierney
Celtic Pride
1982 C-27, 5282
Middle River, Maryland
- Re: catalina27-talk: Favorite Stories DMTierney
- catalina27-talk: The Long Way Home The Emmerichs
